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) Doeunient No. 286 



VASES PRESENTED BY THE 
REPUBLIC OF FRANCE 



PROCEEDINGS 

IN THE 

SENATE O'F THE UNITED STATES 

UPON THE OCCASION 

OF THE PRESENTATION BY AMBASSADOR JUSSERAND, 

ON BEHALF OF THE REPUBLIC OF FRANCE, OF 

TWO VASES FROM THE NATIONAL 

MANUFACTURE OF SEVRES 



SEPTEMBER 24, 1918 




WASHINGTON 

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 

1918 



U S>. VjONXQveJ^S. . ^e.>LA-A\ 



6Sth Consr^in. 2d Sc-»l 



Senate Document No. 286 



VASES PRESENTED BY THE 
REPUBLIC OF FRANCE 



PROCEEDINGS 

IN THE 

SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

UPON THE OCCASION 

OF THE PRESENTATION BY AMBASSADOR JUSSERAND, 

ON BEHALF OF THE REPUBLIC OF FRANCE, OF 

T^VO VASES FROM THE NATIONAL 

MANUFACTURE OF SEVRES 



SEPTEMBER 24. 1918 




WASHINGTON- 
GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 
1918 



^^q. ^^ 



_K^ 



SENATE RESOLUTION NO. 311. 

Reported by Mr. Smith of Arizona. 

In the Senate of the United St.^tes, 

September 50, JQ18. 
Resolved, That the proceedings in the Senate upon the acceptance of the vases 
presented by the French Government be printed as a Senate document, with 
illustrations. 
Attest: 



n, •!' .*. 

fEB 2iJ9l9 



VASES PRESENTED BY THE REPUBLIC OF FRANCE. 



WEDNESDAY. SEPTEMBER 11, 1918. 

The Vice President. The Chair lays before the Senate a coni- 
iminication from the President of the United States, together with 
a letter from the ambassador from France to the United States, 
which will be read. 

The Secretary read as follows: 

To the Senate and House of Representatives: 

In compliance with the request of the French Ambassador, I transmit herewith, 
for the information of the Congress, a letter from the ambassador expressing the 
desire of his Government to offer to each of the two Houses of Congress a vase 
from the National Manufacture of Sfevres. 

WooDROW Wilson. 

The White House, September 11, 191S. 

Ambassade da la RfepuBLiQUE Fran^aise aux Etats-Unis, 

Washington, le 9 septembre 1918. 

Dear Mr. President: Anxious to show their profound appreciation of the way 
in which Congress received the Viviani-JofFre mission when it came to express 
France's sisterly gratitude for America's timely help, my Government is desirous, 
if so allowed, to offer to each of the two Houses a vase from our National Manu- 
facture of Sfevres. 

Our hope is that those products of French craftsmanship may be kindly accepted 
and preserved as a token of what France feels toward the representatives of the 
American States and citizens, whose manly resolutions, suggested by yourself, each 
of them meeting the country's warmest approval, will have had such a decisive 
influence on the severest conflict, and the greatest by its consequences, the world has 
ever known. 

I should be very much obliged to you if you were so good as to inform the Senate 
and House of the Representatives of the intention of the Government of the French 
Republic and of its motives. 

I have the honor to be, dear Mr. President, 
Very respectfully and sincerely, yours, 

JUSSERAND. 

The Vice President. The message and accompanying letter 
will be referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations and printed. 

(3) 



TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 17, 1918. 

Mr. PoMERENE. Mr. President, from the Committee on Foreign 
Relations I present a resolution under its instructions, and I ask 
unanimous consent for its present consideration. 

The Vice President. The Senator from Ohio, from the Com- 
mittee on Foreign Relations, presents a resolution, which the 
Secretary will read. 

The Secretary read the resolution (S. Res. 305), as follows: 

Resolved, That the Senate of the United States has received with deep satisfaction 
the communication of the ambassador of the French Republic to the United States 
conveying the desire of the French Government to present to the Senate a vase from 
the National Manufacture of Sevres. 

Resolved, That this oifer is accepted with the highest appreciation of the gift 
and of the spirit in which it is presented, and that the 24th day of September, 1918, 
at the hour of 1 o'clock p. m., is hereby set apart for the purpose of formally and 
officially accepting such gift. 

Resolved, That the French ambassador be notified of this action of the Senate 
and requested to attend as the representative of his Government. 

The Vice President. Is there objection to the present con- 
sideration of the resolution? 

The resolution was considered by unanimous consent and 
unanimously agreed to. 



TUESDAY. SEPTEMBER 24, 1918. 
Mr. Martin, of Virginia. Mr. President, as arrangements have 
been made for the ceremonies at i o'clock in connection with the 
presentation of the vases by the French Republic, I am going to 
move for a recess; but I will state the reason for the roll call. I 
think this is a national occasion, and it is very important that 
there should be as many Senators as possible present in recognition 
of this international event. 

As we shall take a recess for that purpose, and I know of no 
pressing business, I move that the Senate recess until I2 o'clock 
meridian on Thursday next. 
The motion was agreed to. 

The Vice President. The hour of i o'clock having arrived, 
the Chair will request Mr. Martin, of Virginia, Mr. Lodge, Mr. 
Williams, Mr. Brandegee, Mr. Pomerene, and Mr. McCumber to 
repair to the Vice President's room and escort the French ambas- 
sador to the Chamber. 

The French ambassador, M. Jusserand, preceded by the Sei- 
geant at Arms and the Secretary of the Senate, was escorted to 
the Chamber by the committee named by the Vice President, and 
he was seated on the right of the Vice President. 

The Vice President. The Secretary will read the Senate reso- 
lution heretofore adopted. 

The Secretary read Senate resolution 305, submitted by Mr. 
Pomerene on the 17th instant and agreed to by the Senate on that 
day, as follows: 

Resolved, That the Senate of the United States has received with deep satisfaaion 
the communication of the ambassador of the French Republic to the United States 
conveying the desire of the French Government to present to the Senate two vases 
from the National Manufacture of Sevres. 

Resolved, That this ofFer is accepted with the highest appreciation of the gift 
and of the spirit in which it is presented, and that the 24th day of September, 1918, 
at the hour of i o'clock post meridian, is hereby set apart for the purpose of formally 
and officially accepting such gift. 

Resolved, That the French ambassador be notified of this action of the Senate 
and requested to attend as the representative of his Government. 

The Vice President. Gentlemen of the Senate, the ambassador 
of the French Republic to the United States. [Great applause.] 

(5) 



ADDRESS BY M. JULES J. JUSSERAND, 

Ambassador of the French Republic to the United States. 

M. JussERAND. Mr. President and gentlemen of the Senate, as 
a token of gratitude for the reception granted by this assembly 
to a few representative Frenchmen sent last year in order to wel- 
come America to the ranks of the active defenders of right, these 
vases are offered to the Senate. Commemorating a modern event, 
they are themselves modern and come from that Sfevres manu- 
facture, near Paris, where mementos of America abound, recalling 
the perpetual friendship between our two countries, busts of Wash- 
ington, Franklin, Jefferson, Lincoln, Lafayette. [Applause.] 

The decision of the President and of Congress to take part in 
the war had sent a thrill of joy throughout France, not simply 
because of the aid but because of the justification. Our faith 
that our living and our dead had made their manifold sacrifices 
for a supremely great and just cause received its most telling con- 
firmation when, from across the ocean, the voice of this great 
Nation was heard above the din of battle, saying, from now on 
"until the last gun is fired," until right triumphs not for a time 
but for all times, we take our place by your side. [Applause.] 

Our great thinker, Pascal, once drew up this aphorism: "Justice 
without force is powerless; force without justice is tyrannical." 
We wanted the mission sent to you last year to represent both; 
and it was led, therefore, by Mr. Viviani, minister of justice, whose 
winged, fiery words are still remembered on these shores, and by 
one who, at a solemn hour in the history of the world, personated 
what President Wilson has described in one of his memorable 
addresses as "Force; force to the utmost, force without stint or 
limit, the righteous and triumphant force which shall make right 
the law of the world," Marshal Joffre, the winner of the Marne. 
Of the two ways of expressing one's self, that of Marshal Joffre, 
of Marshal Foch, who started from the same Marne a pursuit that 

(7) 



Vases Presented by the Republic of France 

is not near its end, of Marshal Haig and his admirable Britishers, 
of Gen. Pershing, who has given back to France a portion of 
France, and of their companions in arms in Belgium, Italy, Pales- 
tine, the Balkans, Siberia, is the only one our enemy understands — 
he has never tired of saying so himself — and since we want to be 
understood we mean to use no other. [Applause.] 

We have to deal with a strange enemy; I shall not say a mon- 
strous enemy, though in fact such he is. [Laughter and applause.] 
He can devise, he can not understand. 

He can devise liquid fire, poisonous gases, poisonous propa- 
ganda, noxious germs to be sent by his diplomatic pouch to neutral 
countries, as happened in Norway and Roumania — after which he 
wonders that he has no friends — an accurate shelling of Rheims, 
burning of Louvain, sinking of the Lusitania and of hospital ships, 
perfectly appointed wagons to carry off loot, the efficient slavery of 
civilians. 

He sometimes reproaches us lor not knowing when we are beaten; 
along this line, let us confess it, we are beaten; along this line, and 
along no other, Heaven be praised, and never shall be. [.Applause.] 

He can devise; he can not understand; he has no eyes to see, 
no heart to feel. He can not pretend that while preparing his 
onslaught he lacked informers in any country of the world. They 
were mostly of his own blood, and he concluded from what they 
told him that when "der Tag" should come Belgium would be 
found benumbed in fright, France in decay, England in indifference, 
America in business. The answer was Lifege, Marne, Ypres, St. 
Mihiel. [Applause.] 

They forgot in their calculations one imponderable item — sen- 
timent. They could not understand that sentiment is a force, the 
greatest of all, in our days; that sentiment leads the world and 
has caused one nation after another, in Europe, in North, Central, 
and South America, in Asia, in Africa even, to rise up and sa\', 



nled by the Republic of Fi 



"Till the end we are with you." Sentiment is the force behind 
those particular guns that shall win the day. 

Of the value of this force we French are better aware than 
anyone, for it happened to us to sow the seed on these shores 
long, long ago, without thinking of the future; and behold, like 
the grain of mustard seed, it has grown and waxed a great tree. 
[Applause.] 

They can not understand. Our attitude during the many years 
between the two German wars was as unprovocative as it well could 
be, from which they just concluded that we must be in decay. Our 
policy was publicly expressed and acted upon, but they would not 
believe and could not understand. In an address of April 13, 
1912, one of our statesmen, on an occasion of international sig- 
nificance, said: 

France will neither attack nor provoke, but in order to be assured that she herself 
will be neither attacked nor provoked she must have land and sea forces capable 
of commanding respect. 

This Statesman was then prime minister and is now President of 
the French Republic, M. Raymond Poincare. 

The doors are shut, the curtains are drawn; with hushed voices 
select accomplices decide that "der Tag" has come for the greatest 
crime in the world's history. No outsider can hear or see; no one 
shall know. Yet all the world knows, for the crime has cried to 
heaven, and the dark date of the Potsdam council, July 5, 1914, 
will be execrated throughout ages. 

Any pretext would be good enough to justify the decision, for 
the true justification was to be success; and force moreover needs, 
they think, no justification. For the Serbs the pretext resorted to 
was the assassination of an Austrian prince by an Austrian subject; 
for the Belgians, necessity which, as all burglars are aware, "knows 
no law"; for France, a pipe-dream accusation of our having shelled 
Nuremberg from the air. Force was so much to be the justification 

(9) 



Vases Presented by the Republic of France 

of it all, and so little care was considered necessary that, in their 
tragedy, the Germans played the epilogue before the prologue, and 
one day before they declared war on us because of Nuremberg the}' 
had begun hostilities. Their declaration is of Monday evening, 
August 3. On Sunday, the 2d, their horsemen had penetrated 
more than 7 miles on French territory, killed Corp. Peugeot, head 
of a small platoon from the Forty-fourth Infantry, a young man 
of 21, in times of peace a public-school teacher; their own leader, 
Lieut. Camille Mayer, was killed by us, and his tomb at Joncherey 
will testify forever as to what the dawn of "der Tag" was Hke. 

The Kaiser thereupon solemnly declared in Berlin, "The sword 
has been forced into our hands," and all the echoes in Germany 
dutifully repeated and continue to repeat, "The sword has been 
forced into our hands; the sword has been forced into our hands." 
We knew from that moment what to expect. 

In the dust and smoke of the immense fight the skies are some- 
times beclouded and we do not know the time of day, but we feel 
that we are moving toward the evening of "der Tag" and that 
evening will see the doom of those men who, even at this late hour, 
as unable as before to understand, still exercise their faculty of 
devising, and methodically ravage, defile, and destroy the parts of 
France which they have to abandon, cunningly arranging bombs 
with time fuses that may kill people returning to their ruined 
homes. The hour of their doom is coming. [Applause.] 

They now pretend their eyes begin to open and they "babble" 
of peace, the peace of wrong, of course, the only one they can 
understand, not the peace of right; thev still admire their Treitschke, 
who said: 

Small St.ites have no right to exist, for they lack the essential state element^ — force. 
They have therefore no rights. 

The four treaties they have signed this spring with Ukraine, 

Russia, Finland, and Roumania testify to this, being treaties not 

of peace but of bondage. 

(10) 



Vases Presented by the Republic of France 

The honest nations of the world feel differently. They feel 
that "the small States of the world have a right to enjoy the same 
respect for their sovereignty and for their territorial integrity that 
great, powerful nations expect and insist upon." So spoke Presi- 
dent Wilson. We feel with him. France has never thought of 
fighting for her own Alsace-Lorraine only; she fights and will fight 
to the end for the liberation of all the Alsace-Lorraines still in 
servitude throughout the world. [Applause.] 

We are now at one of the grandest periods in the history of the 
world. We see sights never to be seen again; not only scenes of 
horror, but scenes of splendor. To those latter scenes American 
contribution is one of which you and your descendants may well 
be proud forever. Seeking, to use again the terms of your Presi- 
dent, no conquest, no dominion, no indemnities, no material com- 
pensation, acting as "one of the champions of the rights of man- 
kind," your Nation has stood the severest tests and offered a 
wonderful example. It is enough to say to her, "It is for justice; 
it is for liberty; it is in order that suffering people in far-away 
lands may cease to suffer," and the Nation to a man, to a woman, 
to a child, answers at once, agreed and content. Not even laws, 
but recommendations, mere suggestions, are obeyed, for the cause 
is in their eyes a sacred one, and all that can help it has to them 
something sacred. Immense loans are oversubscribed; the absten- 
tion from certain foods, the giving up of certain perfectly honest 
enjoyments are accepted with alacrity. How could it be otherwise 
when those men and women offer, without flinching, to the great 
cause the blood of their blood, the heart of their hearts, their own 
sons, to fight their battles over there. [Applause.] 

And is it not a peerless honor for this country, the fact that the 
laws implying the greatest sacrifice or effort are passed by a unani- 
mous vote.'' The law, for example, extending the draft age to i8 
and to 45. A unanimous vote was recorded the other day in the 
House for a law increasing taxation by some $4,000,000,000. 

(n) 



Vases Presented by the Republic of France 

What is now the time of day? Is "der Tag" nearly spent? 
Foch, Haig, Pershing, and their peers will tell us when they think 
fit. [Applause.] All we need to know is that we are in, all of 
us, "until the last gun is fired"; and why are we in ? We are in, 
as I take it, in order to give its proper value to a document about 
as sacred to us French as to you Americans and which recalls for 
us common souvenirs. It is to make good for the world the 
Declaration of Independence. [Applause.] 

I shall end by a personal word, a word of thanks, and say that 
I shall ever consider it as one of the greatest honors in a long 
career to have been privileged to address this august assembly. 
[Prolonged applause.] 




HON. THOMAS 
VICE PRESIDENT OF 



ADDRESS BY HON. THOMAS R. MARSHALL, 

Vice President of the United States. 

The Vice President. Mr. Ambassador, who among the sons of 
the Republic can distill into the attar of language the love of the 
American people for France.^ [Applause.] Not I. Who, in a 
few figures of speech, can compute the debt of gratitude we owe 
the French people as with accumulated interest it has been trans- 
mitted from sire to son for sevenscore years .? [Applause.] Not I. 
Who hopes that, whatever other crime our country may be com- 
pelled to face at the bar of impartial justice, it may not be ingrati- 
tude ? All of us. Who hopes that, from "the Tiger" to the 
loneliest orphan in the stricken homes of France, there is not one 
who has a dream of the shadow of a doubt that we are with them 
to the end [applause], with them until the lilies shall bloom on all 
her soil, with them till justice wipes away all their tears and fears, 
and avenges, though it can not obliterate, all the scars of all their 
wrongs ? Every red-blooded American. [Applause.] 

Dear Mr. Ambassador, beloved of the American people for your 
own sake as well as for your country's, the ghosts of innocent 
women, helpless children, and feeble age are calling to God, to 
America, and to civilization. Rest content. They do not call in 
vain. [Applause.] 

I am not striving to weave a beautiful garment. I am only 
seeking to dress a great truth in the clothing of speech, however 
tawdry and misfit it may be. That truth is found in a story told 
of Mahomet. His first wife, Kadijah, was a widow. But she 
made of the camel driver the founder and head of a great religion. 
Then she died, and in his old age the prophet married the young, 
charming, and beautiful Ayesha. Consistently with human nature, 
she would sit upon Mahomet's knees, pull his gray beard, and 
petulantly ask, "Am I not a better wife than Kadijah?" Worn 
out at last, the prophet made answer, "No, by Allah; there can 
(13) 



Vases Presented by the Republic of France 

be none better, for she believed in nie when all men despised me." 
Since far off 1776 we have grown rich and powerful and many 
seek our favors and many are our friends, but none can get closer 
to our hearts than France, for she believed in us when all men 
despised us. [Applause.] 

Mr. Ambassador, you know us better than we know ourselves. 
Yet still I hope your judgment coincides with mine. All the 
conscious days of my life I have watched the attitude of this 
people toward war and warriors. It has been an intense hatred 
of war as an abstract proposition and a flaming, never-dying 
enthusiasm for it when it had for its concrete objects justice, truth, 
liberty, and fraternity. [Applause.] It has been a supreme con- 
tempt for the warrior who has waded through slaughter to a throne, 
and a never-ending burning of incense before the shrines of those 
who died for man. That sentiment accounts for our whole-hearted 
entry into this war. I am just an average American and my 
thoughts on these great questions, I venture to assert, meet the 
approval of my fellow countrymen. I never owned or wanted a 
counterfeit presentment of Napoleon; but I wish I might have 
seen Charles Martel. I thrill at the seraphic face of the Maid of 
Orleans. I look with love each day at the photograph of Joseph 
JofFre. [Applause.] And I hope the good God, ere my race is 
run, will let me grasp reverently the hand of Ferdinand Foch. 
He will conquer and survive, for, never fear, Bethlehem must 
triumph over Berlin. [Applause.] 

I accept, in the name of the Senate of the United States, this 
touching and beautiful gift of the French Republic. I bid you 
convey to your Government our genuine appreciation of this 
thoughtful and unexpected courtesy. This legislative body had no 
small part in another far-off and, happily, almost forgotten war, in 
making a Union of indestructible States. May I express the hope 
and belief that it will be the purpose and endeavor of this Senate 



Vases Presented by the Republic of France 

to maintain an indissoluble friendship with the people of France 
till the heavens are rolled together as a scroll. [Prolonged ap- 
plause.] 

I venture to assume that the Ambassador will be glad to meet 
the Senators of the United States. 

M. Jusserand took his place at the left of the Vice President's 
desk and the Members of the Senate were respectively presented 
to him by the committee which had been appointed by the Vice 
President. 

On the conclusion of the ceremonies (at i o'clock and 30 minutes 
p. m.), the Vice President, under the previous order, declared the 
Senate to be in recess until Thursday, September 26, 19 18, at 12 
o'clock meridian. 



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